GTM Live

After a week off of Demand Gen Live, Chris and Megan were back last night for the Tuesday evening installment where they covered the following topics: A big shift in B2B Search (SEO/SEM) dynamics, Is the MQA the new MQL?, Breaking down what happens when Marketing crushes their pipeline goals & sales misses quota by 50%, Word of Mouth is driving a lot of business for you that you don't recognize, Why the entire GTM motion should have some shared goals, andUngated content and the attribution dilemma.  Register here for our next DGL Keynote, on Thursday August 26th at 12pm EDT.

This conversation was repurposed from Chris Walker's appearance as a guest on the B2B Made Simple Podcast. They got into the weeds in regards to organic social content strategy. Sam asked Chris questions about channels for new user acquisition, experimenting, metrics and the nitty gritty behind podcasting and creating content. Chris shared that the opportunity on LinkedIn organic isn't over, but it's certainly more challenging than it was a year or two ago. 

Dustin Deno, SVP of Global Sales at Showpad, joined Chris on the podcast to address the following question: "when we stop generating leads that don't close, how are we going to keep our SDR team busy? They discussed an alternative for going outbound - intent, as well as how sales teams respond to this type of change. They also covered both the benefits and the challenges of this type of go-to-market and strategy change. 

Triana Mills, Creative Director at Refine Labs, joined us for another Back to Basics episode, this time on the topic of The Power of Creative in B2B Marketing. Triana and Chris answered questions about the advantages of using good creative in B2B and how marketers can better work with their creative team to drive more expansive tests and engaging creative. 

We recorded Chris’s LIVE session from the B2B Sales & Marketing Exchange 2021 in Boston, MA where he talks about how the marketers that are focusing on the dark funnel are the ones who are winning. This involves giving people information they want in the places they want to consume it, on their own time, as well as a fundamentally different mindset and measurement criteria. Instead of using the dark funnel to activate outbound sales, marketers should be focusing on driving signals in the dark funnel by putting valuable content there.

Chris Walker and Megan Bowen hosted another Demand Gen Live last night, breaking down the Refine Labs strategy for the community and talking about the more effective alternatives to buyer personas. Chris expanded on the dark funnel and connected that concept to splitting the funnel. He also answered questions about opportunities outside of your 9-5 in marketing, the most important questions marketers should be able to answer about their customers, and measuring the impact of marketing to prospects already in the buying cycle.

Chris Walker hosted another live consulting session, this time with a post-seed stage start-up that is currently following the organic playbook we have shared on the podcast. You'll get to hear about things that the founders and practitioners noticed in their own business after implementing the strategy, and how you can implement an organic content strategy yourself with little to no resources. Chris answers their questions about measurement and how to paint the picture to investors, and they reiterate the importance of educating and providing value to their ICP instead of constantly trying to sell to them in an impersonal way.

We hosted a Demand Gen Expert Session with Tom Wentworth, CMO at Recorded Future, to talk about the catch-22 of attribution and what marketers can and should do about it. We've all been in a place where the challenges of attribution are apparent. When you're hitting your numbers, no one cares about attribution. But when you're not, that's when others become critical of it.

Chris Walker and Megan Bowen hosted Demand Gen Live again last night and covered the following agenda:-What happens when Marketing aligns to REVENUE instead of "leads" or SQLs, -How "ABM" breaks down at execution, and  -The blurring line between marketing & sales as well as how Chris distinguishes the two.  They also answered questions about where SDRs should sit in an org chart, the best sources for marketing education, why many marketers end up doing sales not marketing, the issues that come with scaling too quickly, and when you align to revenue what should happen vs. what you'll notice initially happening.Register here for tomorrow's live event with Tom Wentworth, CMO at Recorded Future. We'll be discussing The Catch 22 of Attribution & How B2B Marketers Should Respond.

Joe Mullings, Chairman & CEO of The Mullings Group Companies, joined Chris in the Refine Labs podcast studio for a discussion about what's changing in the hiring landscape and how companies should respond. Joe shared that "the market has changed more in the past 12 months than my previous 30 years in the business.” They talked about work from anywhere vs. working in the office, as an employer how to make the strongest offer possible and improve internal processes, the biggest reasons culture breaks down, and the impact of hiring what Joe calls "force multipliers." Register here for next week's live event with Chris Walker and Dave Gerhardt.